


is that too much to expect?  that i would name the stars for you?

by incalyscent



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Angel Wings, F/M, Holding Hands, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Kissing, Lowercase, Lucifer Morningstar (Lucifer TV) Has Daddy Issues, Stargazing, Wings, but what else is new, i just love putting in all the pure tags, local poet does prose, no beta we die like men, yet again a really long title about stars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-13
Updated: 2019-07-13
Packaged: 2020-06-27 10:00:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19788571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/incalyscent/pseuds/incalyscent
Summary: there are so many stars that there’s hardly an inch of blackness.  the headlights go out, and that number increases three times over.“wow,” chloe says.  she feels more than sees lucifer turns his head to look at her.“you like them?”  he says.  he has an old note of cockiness in his voice, like a piano chord held down too long.  it makes chloe smirk.“what?  did you hang them for me?”  her tone is teasing, expecting a line from him.“i would’ve,” is his soft reply.





	is that too much to expect?  that i would name the stars for you?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [swankkat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/swankkat/gifts).



> we have not touched the stars,  
> nor are we forgiven, which brings us back  
> to the hero’s shoulders and a gentleness that comes,  
> not from the absence of violence, but despite  
> the abundance of it. the lawn is drowned, the sky on fire,  
> the gold light falling backward through the glass  
> of every room. i’ll give you my heart to make a place  
> for it to happen, evidence of a love that transcends hunger.  
>  **is that too much to expect? that i would name the stars  
>  for you?** that i would take you there? the splash  
> of my tongue melting you like a sugar cube? we’ve read  
> the back of the book, we know what’s going to happen.  
> the fields burned, the land destroyed, the lovers left  
> broken in the brown dirt. and then it’s gone.  
> makes you sad. all your friends are gone. goodbye  
> goodbye. no more tears. i would like to meet you all  
> in heaven.
> 
> -richard siken, _snow and dirty rain_.

it had been a hard case. it involved a lot of travel, and kids, and chloe _hates_ the ones that involve kids. she is so tired she lets lucifer drive home, and she’s so tired that he drives the speed limit. he had been that combination distant and all too present, and chloe had to watch his face mirror that of a beaten child all day and she aches with it.

so they are quiet. he drives the speed limit with his eyes focused forwards, index finger tapping out a tune on the radio like it’s second nature. chloe rests her head on the window and lets the rocking of the car work some soreness into her neck. outside, the desert spreads wide and lonely on all sides.

“detective?” lucifer’s voice is soft.

“yeah?”

“are you alright?”

chloe straightens up to look at him. he’s still looking through the windshield, a little cramped, because he didn’t move her seat back. “i don’t like the ones with kids,” chloe says. he inclines his head a fraction.

“i know. that’s why i asked.” chloe watches a muscle in his jaw jump. she trusts him well enough now that she knows he’ll talk when he wants to. there’s a few more minutes of quiet, so far as to get far enough away from any city that none of their light spills out.

“do you mind if we pull over?” lucifer says over the sound of rushing tires.

“why, is something wrong?” chloe asks, back from the precipice of sleep. he snorts softly, giving a minute shake of his head and a smile that doesn’t go all the way up to his eyes.

“no. just need to stretch the legs, is all.”

chloe reaches over and squeezes lucifer’s hand where it rests on the stick shift. she smiles, slow and tired. “okay.”

gradually, lucifer twists the wheel until the tires leave the road. the car isn’t exactly made for offroading, but he is slow enough that it doesn’t jar her too badly. the car rolls to a halt, and lucifer cuts the engine and lets the quiet of night fall over them like a heavy blanket. he smiles at her, opens the door and says _just a moment_ before unfolding himself onto the dirt outside. the sound of the door closing is very, very loud.

the headlights are still on. chloe watches through the windshield as lucifer fixes his cuffs, wanders to the front of the car and leans against it. his hands come to rest behind him on the hood. his shoulders are tense. back bowed under the weight of something. chloe pulls the lever and the door clicks open. his eyes turn towards her as she lifts herself from the cab, so dark she can see the glitter of stars in them.

she leans up next to him. it’s cold out, so she rubs her arms even though his body next to her radiates heat like an old sun. he sighs, and it’s not an unkind sound, just the one he makes when he’s been caught. still, he pulls his jacket off in a flash of red lining and drapes it over her shoulders, and chloe accepts it wordlessly, flashing him a grateful smile.

“sure you’re okay?” she asks him. he shifts his gaze forwards, fidgets, and then tips his head back to the sky.

“i don’t like the ones with kids either. well, their parents. dads, rather.”

chloe nods and leans into him. “you did kinda lose your shit today.”

lucifer laughs once, and it’s humourless. “very unlike me to get all protective of those little creatures. how they always so _sticky_ , i will _never_ understand.”

despite the topic, chloe chuckles. it makes him smile and rubs a little of the tension out of him, makes him sag against her. she, too, turns her eyes up. there are so many stars that there’s hardly an inch of blackness. the headlights go out, and that number increases three times over.

“wow,” chloe says. she feels more than sees lucifer turns his head to look at her.

“you like them?” he says. he has an old note of cockiness in his voice, like a piano chord held down too long. it makes chloe smirk.

“what? did you hang them for me?” her tone is teasing, expecting a _line_ from him.

“i would’ve,” is his soft reply. chloe’s heart freezes like a deer and then kicks up again like a hummingbird. lucifer sighs, and leans back just enough that contact is broken between them. chloe shivers. 

they are quiet for a long time before lucifer breaks it. “i miss it sometimes. _making_ things instead of breaking them.”

chloe swivels her head around and the light of every star is caught in the dark of his eyes. in the moonlight, his skin reflects silver. “lucifer-”

“ _why me?_ ” he asks, earnest and open. he doesn’t take his eyes off the sky but there are twice as many of them in his eyes, glistening bright. chloe aches, and closes the distance between then again. she covers one of his hands with her own, and he blinks over to her. he looks shocked. she just pushes her shoulder into his and lays her head on it softly, like going to bed.

“i don’t know.”

a pause. a breath.

“i don’t even know why i _care_ so much.”

chloe turns so their knees knock together, and for a moment lucifer looks like he wants to crawl backwards up the hood of the car, but he doesn’t. she knows he’s fragile. could easily flee or throw his walls back up. so she reaches and traces the cut of his jaw with the back of her knuckles, just gently. lucifer’s eyelashes flutter and she watches him debate leaning into her touch.

“your _dad_ cast you out, lucifer,” she says, “whether or not heaven was home, that has to hurt.”

he nods. his scruff rubs her skin raw. “he was supposed to _love_ me,” he says. his voice is small. chloe’s chest squeezes like coil of a snake. she guides his face down to press their foreheads together, and he lets her, his eyes pinched shut. “but he cast me out,” he says, his breath on her face, “and he _knew_ , he knew _everything_ , and he - he didn’t even try to _save_ me.”

he finally takes her hand, weaves their fingers together, and brings them to his heart. chloe aches for him. he has lived for so long, and only now has he not been homeless. there is no word to describe the type of sadness she feels for him. something older than herself; something he could’ve written in the stars, once.

“you had to save yourself.” he jerks back a little at her words, but chloe gives a tiny shake of her head and holds him fast. “you had to, and you did. you made something of yourself. you _made_ yourself a home.”

he makes a noise at the back of his throat and leans into her a little bit more, tightens his hold on her just a little bit more. chloe tries not to be reminded of scared little boys clutching her pant legs, their wide eyes, their fraying souls. but she is. it doesn’t matter how old he is, he’s still a man who desperately wants to be loved. who _is_ loved, and just coming to terms with what that means. who is full of love and doesn’t know what to do with it but grieve.

“i love you,” she says softly, and tips her head to press a kiss to the bridge of his nose. he hums low, and some of the tension melts from his shoulders, leaking out of him like ink on paper.

“i know.”

chloe wrinkles her nose. “did you just han solo me?”

the smile that graces his face is better than water in the desert. he nudges into her, and strokes his thumb over the back of her hand where it sits in the center of his chest.

“maybe.” his tone is laced with affection. “thank you, chloe.”

“of course.” she takes a bit more of a firm hold on his face, so that he tilts his head and looks at her. “i’m going to kiss you now.”

lucifer sighs. “the hardship,” he mutters, his eyes soft. he still meets her halfway, fingers squeezing her hand, his mouth impossibly soft against hers. he sighs when she slides her hand up into his hair, a tremour skittering through him like a fault line. she pours her adoration into him and he drinks it down, and by the time she opens her eyes and leans her forehead back on his, his wings are bathing them in silver light, corporeal and shivering behind him. the shadows they cast across his face make him look so soft she can’t help but touch them.

her hand strokes past his cheek. “hello old friends,” she says, a knuckle tracing the very edge of his outermost feather. they flex as he makes a noise low in his throat, and they catch the light of every star and give it back to her. filling up her eyes in holy light.

he moves closer, the swish of fabric on metal, and touches his head to her shoulder, and suddenly the whole sky is open to her. she sees them first in the glimmer of his wings; at night, they become almost mirror like. the stars streak down, flashing bullet like in her eyes, and her breath leaves her and comes back within the same second.

“lucifer.” her voice is exhilarated enough that he stops trying to burrow into her for a moment, turning his eyes to the stars for them to fall in his eyes.

“well, that’s embarrassing,” he says. his wings reflect his words, drawing in close. “i don’t usually blow my load this early.”

chloe needs a few seconds to reel from his choice of phrasing, her eyelashes fluttering, heat rising to her face, before she shakes her head and pushes a knuckle into his chest until he looks at her. meteors burn and die in great flashes of light, pausing in halos around his head.

“you’re doing this?” his eyes had drifted back down to her, and at her words, lucifer looks back up towards heaven. there’s an expression chloe can’t quite pin down. a bit of embarrassment, but something hopeful and something sad as well. his wings shift, half open, and the stars fall twice as fast.

“lightbringer and all,” is all he says. chloe moves their entwined hands to rest on his thigh, shifting closer to forwards again so she can really tip her head back and stare up at the sky. velvet black poked holes in with starlight. she scoots closer until she can mould into his side, until he has to lift his wing away to accommodate her.

“they’re beautiful,” she says, and she listens to his throat click.

after a moment, he says “they are, aren’t they,” and drapes his wing over her shoulders. the static raises the hair on her arms and tingles all the way to her toes, but his wings are warm and the desert night is a bitter, bitter cold.

-

when chloe awakes, she does so without the knowledge of falling asleep. she also wakes up warm and safe in her bed, with trixie plastered against her side, home from dan’s. she hasn’t been changed from her clothes, but her hair was taken down, and her shoes taken off. if she thinks about it too hard, she can still smell fine whiskey and thunderclouds.

it’s easy to untangle herself from a sound asleep trixie. saturday’s sun gleams dully in through curtained windows, only turning more yellow as chloe slips through the door and makes her way into the kitchen. the sound of sleep’s heavy breaths do not disturb her this mid morning; there is no twitch towards her gun. lucifer’s jacket hangs over the back of the couch, showing just enough that the ruby lining draws her eye to it.

he’s too tall to sleep on the couch. his feet hang off the edge, matching louis vuitton’s carefully discarded on the floor. he is sleep rumpled, hair gone soft, eyeliner smudged. chloe can feel her face go soft, even as she wanders over to sit on the arm of the couch near his head, reaching down to curl a lock of his hair around her finger. he stirs, somewhere on the precipice of wakefulness, but not yet fully committed. chloe takes a moment to be jealous of his eyelashes, and to let her eyes wander shamelessly to where a few of the buttons of his shirt had slipped loose in the night.

“found something you like?” his voice is still soft from sleep, but when chloe lifts her eyes back up his are open and soft, even if his mouth is a lecherous slice. she bites her lip, and pushes her hand into his hair with a bit more conviction, until he makes a low rumble and his face relaxes into something sweeter. she skates her hand down to lay it against the bare skin over his heart, to feel it’s ready thump against her palm.

“yeah, i think i did,” she says. she swears she feels his heart skip a beat. he has the audacity to look bashful. she leans in to press a kiss to his brow. “thank you for taking me home last night.”

he gives a hum. “and thank you for _dealing_ with me, as well,” he says. chloe gives a little shake of her head.

“if you even need to talk, i’m here for you.”

“i know.” he looks so genuinely heartfelt that chloe’s heart squeezes.

she says “do you want breakfast” instead of _i love you_ and he says “i’d love breakfast” instead of _i love you too_. chloe trails her fingers through his hair as a parting gift, and not long after she’s straightened lucifer sits up and tries to put himself back together.

he ends up taking over most of the cooking, just gently knocking his hip to chloe’s until she laughs and gets out of his way. the smell rouses trixie, who can’t keep the delight off her face when she finds lucifer flipping pancakes in the kitchen. unbeknownst to all of them, the daytime sky is full of meteors, burning bright but washed out by the sun. fiery things, tamed by the warmth of morning.

**Author's Note:**

> i listened to the extended version of give me love on repeat to write this ngl
> 
> for swankkat. thank you <3
> 
> incalyscent-writes.tumblr.com


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